In a short time, Kaprel has managed to gain success in the industry and become a known name in the region. With stunning partitions that are locally made and internationally certificatied, their products have definitely made a mark in this niche market.
We spoke to Kharis Atkins, founder and CEO of Kaprel Partitions, as well as James Irvine, Operations Director, and Shrinivas Shet, Project Manager, to learn about the company’s past ‘wins’ and their future in the region and beyond.
Kharis: I have been in the UAE for about 11 years and realised the space in the market for a local manufacturer, as products were being procured from Europe or Asia with excessively long lead times. They also had a higher price point. Kaprel was developed to fill that void so people wouldn’t have to wait too long. Because we are a local manufacturer, we have considerable advantage in the fact that we don’t import a lot of our materials from abroad. That is one of our unique selling points.
James: With my background in the construction industry, I understand the design and buildability of a product. I liked the fact that Kaprel had a smaller team and therefore more hands on.
Srinivas: Kaprel is unique in that it has gained a reputation in the market for it’s great design and cost effectiveness.
Kharis: Kaprel was established in the UAE for a number of reasons, and one of those was to reduce the amount of international freight and carbon footprint that we generate. We extrude all our aluminum profiles in the UAE as well as the gaskets, and all our glass is processed here. Minimal amount of material is made outside of the country. This ability seeks to serve us as a hub for the GCC region, because as a manufacturer here, we are close to a lot of the other countries that are part of the region, and exporting to these countries still makes us more efficient on time and cost than a lot of European products.
Kharis: Kaprel started as a business with me and two other partners. In the five-year period of its existence, we have grown considerably. We have a very large team of installation technicians on site, and a substantial group of project management and support staff. The amount of growth we have had in this region is a testament to what we have seen as the vision for the company, which is understanding the market requirements and then filling that void. A good sense of achievement for me is the projects we get to be a part of and the designers we get to work with. One such project is The Bee’ah by Zaha Hadid – a truly significant one for us because of who the designer is and, of course, being a landmark project.
Since the birth of Kaprel, it has been a fantastic journey and I am really happy and blessed to have such a good team with me. As a company we are growing and expanding into various countries. We have built a strong brand and now it’s about distributing it… hopefully even globally.
Kharis: It’s a challenging year. There are certain specific goals we have, one of which is expansion. We currently work in Bahrain and Oman. We will be looking heavily into the Saudi and India markets. Those businesses will be predominantly from a distribution perspective.
Personal goal for this year is to spend more time with my family. It’s always easy to say, “we need to have a work-life balance”, but it’s very hard as an owner/entrepreneur to actually facilitate that when you have a lot of people that rely on you for specific things. We have brought in quite a few staff to assist us in the management team. As a goal, I also want to do more traveling and just relax a bit! Ultimate travel place would be Antarctica, but there is a lot more preparation involved, you can’t just up and go!
James: I would like to see the company running as a well oiled machine. We are looking at improving procurement and programming because the projects come in thick and fast, and we have to do these in tandem. There is a proper structure in place, but we need to improve on it and be able to have it run by itself.
Personal goals for this year? If I can get taller and grow some hair! On a serious note, I would like to travel to Argentina, where I had spent some time in the past, almost eight years ago, but have not travelled since.
Srinivas: Our goal is to get more projects in the country for this year. Personally, I want to make sure we sustain our client satisfaction rates by continuing to provide not only glassworks but also, in some cases, adjacent ceiling works, and more. So continuing with that success is key…
